Filderstadt, GER – October 8, 2003: Eurosport and the WTA Tour announced today the extension of their multi-year broadcast agreement, which calls for the leading pan-European sports channel to devote more coverage to WTA Tour
tournaments throughout Europe than ever before.
Eurosport, which began airing WTA Tour tournaments in 1999, will continue broadcasting WTA Tour events through 2007. Each year, Eurosport will deliver an unprecedented 420 hours of coverage of 27 WTA Tour tournaments, in addition to supporting WTA Tour events through its website,
www.eurosport.com and its sports news channel Eurosportnews.
The extension of the agreement punctuates Eurosport’s increasing dedication to women’s professional tennis, which continues to grow in popularity worldwide. With this extension, Eurosport’s coverage of WTA Tour tournaments
has doubled since its’ inaugural year of televising women’s professional tennis four years ago.
‘Eurosport clearly recognizes the enormous value in televising women’s professional tennis,” WTA Tour Chief Executive Officer Larry Scott said.
‘Their extraordinary commitment to covering our tournaments speaks to the attractiveness and vitality of women’s tennis in Europe and beyond.’
‘By extending our contract until the end of 2007,Eurosport is confirming its continued support of the WTA Tour. We’re proud to be not only a broadcaster but also truly involved in the development of women’s tennis.’ Angelo Codignoni, President and Chief Executive Officer of Eurosport.
The extension is being announced at a press conference today during the WTA Tour’s Porsche Tennis Grand Prix tournament. As part of the announcement, Eurosport will unveil its promotional Magic Bus. This promotional Bus will
be co-branded with Eurosport and the WTA Tour’s ‘Get In Touch With Your Feminine Side” campaign and will be travelling to tournaments across Europe to promote the sports channel’s WTA Tour programming.
With Eurosport and WTA Tour…
‘Get In Touch With Your Feminine Side!’
The WTA Tour is the world’s premier professional sport for women with more than 1,000 players representing 76 nations competing for more than $52 million in prize money at the Tour’s 59 events in 31 countries. More than 4 million people attended women’s tennis events in 2002 with millions more watching events on television networks around the world. The WTA Tour’s season concludes with the WTA Tour Championships presented by Porsche at STAPLES Center in Los Angeles, California, 5-10 November 2003. Additional
information on the Tour can be found on the Internet at www.wtatour.com
The Eurosport Group is today the leading multimedia platform in Europe with Eurosport, eurosport.com and Eurosportnews. The pan-European channel Eurosport, available in 18 different languages, reaches 95 million homes and 220 million viewers across 54 countries. Available in 5 languages, eurosport.com is now clearly established as one of the leading pan-European sports websites with up to 80 million pages viewed per month (World Cup 2002). Eurosportnews is providing up to date worldwide sports news and is already transmitted in 7 languages in over 70 different countries.
For more details contact:
Eurosport:
Isabelle Nguyen / Susan Dumontaud-Leger Inguyen@eurosport.co.uk /sdumontaudleger@eurosport.co.uk Tel: +33 1 4093 8142 / +33 1 4093 8270
WTA Tour:
Darrell Fry
dfry@wtatour.com
Tel: +727 895 5000
British Eurosport:
Martin Johnston / Tristan Lewinsohn
mjohnston@eurosport.co.uk / tlewinsohn@eurosport.co.uk
Tel. +44 207 468 7777